How Elena Gilbert Adapts
by Sakurane
Summary: In a momentary lapse of sanity, Elena decides that if she looks so much like Katherine, she'll be Katherine. Damon doesn't react well.
1. Chapter 1

Author Note: Angtsy fic, coming up. Don't be afraid to leave a review! I do not own Vampire Diaries.

Today was one of those days.

Elena was in a bad mood from the moment her eyes opened to the light streaming from her window. It didn't help that she knew Damon would be downstairs, just waiting to annoy her. That was how it was between them.

He would antagonize her, she would react badly, and they would argue, then stop speaking to each other for the rest of the day. Then it would begin again the next morning. As much as she hated fighting with him, it was the most normal part of her life then. Both she and Damon seemed to deal with stress in a similar way. Stephen was still under Klaus's control, Katherine hadn't been found, Tyler and Caroline were barely holding it together trying to find Elijah, Bonnie and Jeremy were researching how to kill Klaus off for good. Elena, meanwhile, was losing her mind.

She caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror that morning, making her shudder. All she saw was Katherine, or maybe an uglier version of her. No whirlwind curls, a few pimples on her previously flawless skin... _God, when did I get so vain?_

Sure, she'd pretended to be during her earlier life in Mystic Falls, but she hadn't actually put in an effort. She hadn't really cared, beyond it being a distraction for her pain. Now she was reverting back into the old Elena, the old _fake _one.

Her mind turned once again to Stephen and Damon, as it often did. The latter was infuriating, the former causing nothing but a dull ache. Elena had been through so much recently, she wondered if she'd lost the ability to feel. Except anger. That emotion was the most prominent in her life.

She really was turning into a strange mixture of Katherine and Damon. Heated and short tempered, vain and beautiful.

She stared at back at her reflection, and Katherine stared back. No, it was someone else entirely. Katherine would never look so lost or haunted.

Elena curved her lips in a coquettish fashion, allowing her lashes to fall over her eyes in a sensual way. She liked the way they burned with confidence and a strange hunger that would have seemed out of place on Elena's face. But this was Katherine's.

She could be Katherine. She could be anyone but herself at that moment.

"Maybe I _am _Katherine." She told herself quietly. After all, wasn't she a Petrova Doppelganger? Another copy of the original, just like Katherine?

She reached into the drawer in the vanity, pulling out mascara and eyeliner. With each methodical stroke, she could see herself transforming into someone other that the old Elena. Other than the current one. Maybe this was what she needed to fix things. Out came the curling iron. When she was finished, Elena wasn't sure she could tell _herself _apart from her vampire twin.

A smirk still on her lips, Elena went downstairs. Damon was on the couch, watching the new. Probably looking for reports of murders that could be affiliated to Klaus or Stephen. But so far, the trail had run cold.

"Klaus hasn't lived this long being careless." Elena said.

"But even Klaus can make mistakes." Damon said firmly. "And that'll be even more likely now that Stephen is with him."

"Rippers aren't known for their planning, are they?" Elena returned.

"No. If we're lucky, Klaus might be screwed over by his own pet."

Elena walked around the couch until she was within Damon's sight range, and he stopped and stared. His mouth fell open.

"Katherine-?"

"You'd like that, wouldn't you?" Elena said, leaning forward a bit. "But unfortunately, you'll have to settle for Elena."

"What's wrong with you?" He said sharply.

"What, you don't like the makeover? I thought it would be to your taste, seeing as both you and Stephen have been pursuing Katherine for hundreds of years."

"First of all, since when have you cared about my tastes? And second, _go take off all that makeup."_

"What, am I making you uncomfortable?" Elena blinked at him.

"You're pissing me off, is what you're doing.

"Well, good." She said with satisfaction. "I'm glad I could do something to stir you up."

"Elena. Go fix yourself!"

"You can't boss me around, Damon. I consider this fair, since Katherine had pretended to be me plenty of times. I thought I'd give it a try. And I can see the appeal… it's quite _liberating." _She tilted her head in the way she could remember Katherine doing numerous times.

"You're crazy!" Damon told her.

"Not yet. But I'm getting there."

At the incredulous look Damon was giving her, she laughed. This was too much fun. She'd rarely caught Damon off-guard, so it was worth it to play him at his own game. She didn't have to be Elena, she could be someone else entirely.

"You're _not _Katherine, Elena. So stop pretending to be. Remember who you are." He said seriously.

"I don't rememember." Elena admitted sadly.

Damon embraced her, something very unusual. Elena pushed aside her surprise and let herself be comforted by the most important person in her life who wasn't her immediate family. She wasn't sure why she needed Damon so badly, because he was everything she found repulsive in a vampire, but she also couldn't stop her feelings.

Stifling tears, Elena realized that for the first time in weeks, she and Damon weren't fighting.

Elena washed off the makeup later that night, and rinsing her hair to rid it of the curls. Back were the trusting eyes, a haunted expression, human-like skin. Mortal. Normal. This was who she was _supposed _to be, but Elena felt like as much a stranger to herself as someone she barely knew.

_I may be losing myself, _Elena thought, _But maybe this is how it's meant to be. This is what I need to find someone else. _

Whoever that person might be, Elena was used to change. She had learned to embrace it. This momentary lapse of sanity was just the first step to change. It was like meeting herself for the first time, growing like a child. She'd find a personality that fit, that suited the situation. That was how Elena Gilbert adapted.


	2. The New Elena

**I do not own Vampire Diaries. This takes place after "Our Town" and "The Ties That Bind", when Elena is reborn on the bridge where she nearly died. Such a poignant scene! Wow, this chapter was a whopper to write! But it sort of worked out in the end. **

"You shouldn't be out here so late, Elena."

The sorrowful teenager jolted at the voice behind her, relaxing only when she saw who it was.

"Damon," She greeted the dark-haired vampire.

"You're not planning to jump, are you?" Damon interrupted, "Because I think that would put a _major _wrench in both mine _and _Klaus's plans."

After her very own "Death-Day", celebrated with Matt, he'd left her on the bridge at her own insistence. Darkness had folded down around her, but she couldn't make herself leave the place where she'd nearly died for the first time.

"It's ironic that this is where I've officially been reborn." Elena said, ignoring Damon's suicide comment. She knew that he didn't mean to sound as harsh or unfeeling as he did. Damon was just… Damon.

"I never did understand the whole "rebirth" thing. Seems pretty overrated, don't you think? It's like running away from your past, or trying to forget."

"I'm not trying to forget." She protested. "But the old Elena is dead and buried."

Damon cocked his head and looked at her appraisingly. "And what exactly can I expect from this _new _Elena? I've had a hard enough time gaining trust from the original. Will I have to start all over again?"

Elena smiled, putting a hand on his shoulder. "You don't have to try for me anymore, Damon."

Instead of making a snide comment, he took the hand that was on his jacket and held it in an unassuming way. "Let's get you home. My car's on the other side."

"Okay," She agreed, letting Damon lead her by the hand over the bridge, away from her own demons.

_Let them drown. _She thought.

The ride home was silent, all except for the low hum of the radio that neither of them were listening to, both lost in their own thoughts.

He walked her to her doorstep. Damon smiled crookedly, leaving her at the usual spot on the porch. This was their routine, there moment of parting. But instead of smiling back as she usually, did, Elena stuck out her chin and stared at him with a stubborn expression- one that he hadn't seen her wear since their earlier days of rather strained friendship.

"Stay." She said.

"What?" He was sure he heard her wrong.

Elena's mouth opened and closed a couple of times, than she looked at him confidently again. "I want you to stay."

"And by "stay", you mean you want me to sleep in your house tonight," Damon raised an eyebrow in surprise when she nodded. "You sure that's a good idea?"

"I'm sure."

"And what brought this chain of events on?" Damon asked, stepping closer to her.

She stared at him challengingly. "Maybe the new Elena isn't as responsible, and won't dwell on the past anymore. Maybe she just wants to let go, and accept that she wants some things she shouldn't have."

Damon snorted, "Like what?"

"Like you." Elena said matter-of-factly. She wouldn't deny it, not anymore. Not after she'd admitted to Stefan that they'd kissed, and realized to her core that she didn't regret it. Only that she'd had to keep it a secret.

His eyebrows came together at that. "Elena—" Her lips cut him off. He struggled between kissing her back with passion and stopping… but it was so hard to choose the latter. His senses came back to him after the initial shock, and he pushed her back by the shoulders.

"Elena—we can't. You've got to stop." As much as it pained him to say so, he wouldn't let her regret something so important to him.

"See?" Elena smiled happily.

"What?"

"I knew you wouldn't let me cross the line."

"So that was a test?" Damon asked with an unreadable expression.

"You placed me above yourself, and I won't tell you that doesn't make me happy. I want you, Damon. I was serious about that. But you were right, too. It's not right _now."_

"And you expect to magically know when it's the right time?" He said sarcastically. He was used to being at Elena's pace, and letting Elena pull his hearts by the strings, as it had been for hundreds of years, one Doppelganger after another. Elena had finally managed to pull the bitterness out of him.

"No, Damon. I'm expecting _you _to know." She said, pulling the door open with a hand behind her, never breaking eye-contact with the vampire until it was closed behind her.

Damon stood frozen in the doorway. Had she just relinquished control of their situation to _him? _What the hell was he supposed to do now?

"This has _got _to be another test, or something." He muttered, and stood awkwardly for a few minutes. Did she want him to come in, or not?

"Damn _women!" _He growled to himself in frustration, choosing the gentlemanly route. He'd been denied for the last two years, he could wait another day. But he had a feeling it would take longer than that to decipher what exactly Elena wanted from him.

.

Elena Gilbert was personally dying inside.

She didn't know what she'd expected after her confession to Damon. But the cold shoulder definitely wasn't it. Damon hadn't been round in days, and she was starting to feel the deprivation. He'd switched the job of Elena-watching to _Alaric_ of all people. If it had been Caroline, at least she could have voiced her feminine agonies. If _that _wasn't proof that she couldn't live without Damon, she didn't know what was.

_Or maybe I'm just too dependent on him. _She told herself. But she couldn't being herself to care, either. She was so bored just waiting for him that she eventually forced herself to go to the Grill when Alaric was out. The only place where life flowed at a natural pace.

Much to her shock, the devil himself was there.

"So you've devolved to a day-drinker." She said, sitting on the stool next to the blue-eyed vampire.

He glanced at her and shrugged boyishly.

"C'mon, are you really going to give me the silent treatment? Can I at least know why?"

"I think you can figure it out, Elena. And _you're _the one whose driven me to the bottle so early in the morning."

"What did _I _do?" She asked defensively. "You're the one who just up and disappeared. In case you haven't noticed, Klaus is after all of our heads, so now might not be the best time to abandon your friends."

"Then maybe you shouldn't have chosen now to test me!" He said, finally letting his eyes meet hers. Both pairs were slightly red and shadowed from lack of sleep.

Elena couldn't help but smile. "_That's _what you've been moping about for three days? Damon, I'm not trying to trick you. And I'm not going to change my mind about you, if that's what you're worried about."

"I wasn't worried." He said stiffly, taking another swig of his drink.

"The stop avoiding me."

"Fine. I will." He said.

"Okay… so we're okay? Whatever weird relationship we had before, it hasn't been completely ruined by me?"

Damon ran a finger around the rim of his glass. "So… hypothetically, if I wanted to kiss you right now… you wouldn't regret it, or be angry with me?"

"Hypothetically speaking, I think I've made it clear that I won't." She said.

He leaned in until he could smell Elena's light shampoo, his hand finding a place to rest on her neck. She must have showed before she came to The Grill. "So, if I hypothetically told you that I loved you again, you wouldn't push me away again?"

"Hypothetically speaking, I'll probably go crazy if you don't kiss me right now."

He groaned inwardly. "What about Stefan?"

"I'm none of his concern right now. He doesn't love me anymore, and he doesn't care about my friends or family. So I say: forget him. I need _you, _Damon."

_That's where you're wrong, Elena. Stefan never stopped loving you, and probably never will._

If this was some convoluted test, Damon was determined to fail it. Because he would never stop loving Elena, either. And she was far more important to him than killing Klaus. Showing her that he would love her for all eternity was more important than any enemy either of them could possibly face.

For that moment, both Elena and Damon let their hearts rule them.

.

Elena had to force herself to go to school and pretend that nothing happened.

She'd stepped onto whole new territory by surrendering herself to her feelings for Damon. She could no longer act like everything was the same. Going to school felt like walking in a dream, so irrelevant. She wondered if Bonnie, Caroline, and Tyler felt the same.

Honestly, who cared how you graphed an exponentially decaying problem involving 'e'? Or what year the Industrial Revolution started?

_Why have I been so against becoming a vampire?_ Elena asked herself in Calculus. She'd had a whole list of reasons last year, before Klaus had ever showed up. But they all seemed so juvenile and unimportant now. Who cared about her humanity when her friends were dying all around her? It felt so pointless, like she should just give up and give in. Then she would no longer be a liability, and she'd be able to take care of herself. She'd no longer be a damsel in distress, and she wouldn't put the people she loved in more danger. Klaus would never be able to use her blood to make Hybrids again.

She was holding onto the last shred of hope, the last part of herself that was from the old Elena. If she Turned, she'd lose that hope, and she'd wonder why she was fighting in the first place.

And so she thought, _what if? _What if she let Caroline or Damon Turn her? Or even Stefan, if only as a last resort?

She'd close her eyes, and wake up a vampire.

Damon would help her straddle the line. He'd keep her from falling over it, and maybe even retain some bit of humanity. Sure, Stefan had eventually gone off the wagon, but maybe it wasn't completely inevitable. Damon chose to be good, at least some of the time, and couldn't she do better?

Even if she did lose control, she knew that Damon would bring her back, because that was what she would want. And she'd always do the same for him. She wouldn't give up on Damon, just like she hadn't given up on Stefan. They'd put their wishes and needs on hold for each other. She'd thought she'd had that with Stefan, but she obviously hadn't meant enough to him.

For the first time in many months, her heart didn't hurt when she thought about Stefan. That had to be a good sign.

.

Tension had finally overflowed in the Salvatore home. Stefan was no longer content to let Damon have Elena.

"You have the _nerve _to be jealous! After you took Elena's heart and crushed it into a thousand pieces! She _still _hasn't given up on you, you know!" Damon yelled in disbelief.

"I'm not fueled by jealousy, Damon. I just want Elena to be safe and happy."

"And you're saying that I can't provide those things? That she can't be if she's with me." Damon said flatly.

"No, I'm just saying she can do better. That she _needs _better." Stefan said with conviction.

"Maybe you just don't want _either _of us to be happy. Because if you're miserable, then everyone else should be, too." Damon said venomously.

"You know it's not like that."

"From where I'm standing, brother, that's _exactly _how it is." He said, and ran out of the house as fast as his vampire speed could take him. Stefan didn't follow.

Damon was frustrated, and he had no outlet this time. Years ago, he would have fed on some blonde-bimbo to distract him from his thoughts. But now he had Elena to worry about. He couldn't even drown his sorrows in alcohol, because his stores were all back at the house. He couldn't risk going to the Grill by himself, because he really didn't want to run into Klaus… he wasn't sure if their impasse still stood or not.

_I'm not sure of _anything _anymore._

He wasn't sure what his brother was fighting for, or of Elena's feelings for him, or even if he'd survive the year.

He silently entered Elena's room, not surprised to find it empty. He could hear that she was in Jeremy's room, reminiscing as she so often did.

He stared at the familiar walls and felt a rare loneliness.

He was only a few feet away from the girl he loved… yet he wasn't sure that she would ever be his. He heard shuffling, and footsteps coming towards him. The door had been left open, so he knew that Elena would not be startled by him being there.

"Damon, is something wrong?" Elena asked.

"Yes, Elena, everything's wrong! My damn brother is trying to ruin everything, I can't be with the girl I love _again, _and Klaus has three of his four coffins back. The question is, what's _right_ anymore?" He said.

She kissed him lightly, "This is. Us."

Damon's eyes bore into her intensely, than he just held her.

"Right now. It's _right now."_ He repeated.


	3. Epilogue

**I do not own Vampire Diaries. Sorry about the shortness of this chapter, but I just needed to get this little scene in somewhere!**

"Can't you see what he's doing? Damon is trying to tear us apart." Stefan told her over a Grill Menu. Elena still couldn't believe that she'd agreed to this stupid idea, a dinner with her Ripper ex-boyfriend. Whose brother was waiting not-so-patiently for her just outside the restaurant. He'd insisted on coming just incase something went wrong.

"You did a fine job of that, yourself."

Stefan bit back a retort, and took a calming breath. "You can't trust him, Elena. He lies, he always has."

"We all lie, Stefan. I care more about the reasons. And besides… you obviously trusted your brother, or you wouldn't have saved him over and over again."

"I've made the same _mistake _over and over again."

Elena glared at him. " I'm going to pretend that you didn't just say that, Stefan. Not that it's any of your business anymore, Stefan, but Damon wasn't good for the _old _Elena. But like you said, I've changed."

"Not that much, Elena! Not enough to turn your back on everything you believe in!"

"It's just a reassessment of things, Stefan. The world isn't as black and white as I used to believe, okay? I've had to change some of my values… and is that really such a bad thing?"

"You're growing up, Elena." Stefan said with a suffering expression.

"Like I said… is that such a bad thing?"

"In my opinion, yes. It's too sad." He sounded like the Stefan she'd met in the graveyard.

"You just can't accept that I'm moving on with my life, Stefan. I'm not like you, I can't be stuck at seventeen. I can't stay the same forever." She said honestly.

"Are you sure you're not just using the whole "old Elena, new Elena" thing as an excuse for liking Damon now?" Stefan said harshly.

Elena shook her head. "Stefan, I'll never stop believing in you, and I'll never give up on you… but unless you're back for good, you need to stay the hell out of my life. "

She left before they ever even ordered their food. She made the decision to give her whole heart to Damon that day.

Stefan, though heartless and supposedly lacking in the humanity department, honored that request. He never interfered with her life again. Klaus regained his family and the coffins, and surprisingly left Mystic Falls in a hurry a month later. It was almost like he'd never been there, gone without a trace. The mansion he'd been working so hard to rebuild was left in its half-ruined state, the only reminder of his presence in Virginia.

They all knew that he wasn't gone for good. They still had the fourth coffin in their coffin, so Klaus would be back for it. But they could act like they had some semblance of a normal life, finishing their final years in school and planning their futures.

Even with Klaus looming over their heads, the residents of Mystic Falls were used to the unknown.

Elena _was_ sure of her future with Damon.

A love was lost, but a new love was also gained.


End file.
